Paper Submission April 2, 2012

Neighborhood Experiences and the Influence of Neighborhood Racial Composition in Residential Choice Benjamin F. Jarvis Department of Sociology University of California, Los Angeles PAA 2012 Paper Submission April 2, 2012 Abstract This study asks if individuals learn neighborhood racial composition preferences based on prior experiences in racially mixed or racially homogeneous neighborhoods. In doing so, this study theorizes a mechanism that could induce, exacerbate, or attenu- ate within group and between group heterogeneity in these preferences. Neighborhood outcomes are modeled using conditional logistic regression, with individual residential histories from the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey and neighborhood compositions derived from the US Census serving as data. Models test whether, within black, Latino, and white groups, individuals originating in neighborhoods with different racial mixes use racial composition differently in their subsequent residential choices. Findings show that those who originate in neighborhoods with many Latinos are more likely to move to majority-Latino neighborhoods than those who originate in neighborhoods with few Latinos. This result implies that individuals moderate negative stereotypes of other racial groups in response to between group interaction within neighborhoods. I gratefully acknowledge Robert Mare for the advice he offered during many long discussions concerning the work presented here. I also thank Jennie Brand, Judith Seltzer, Meghan Sweeney, and Mark Handcock for their helpful comments along the way. This work was supported by the UCLA Graduate Division's Graduate Research Mentorship and Graduate Summer Research Mentorship fellowship programs, as well as the California Center for Population Research's NICHD traineeship. This research is based on data from the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey which was funded by grants from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human development (Grants R01 HD035944 and R01 HD049865), the National Institute of Aging (Grant R01 AG022005), and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (Grant R01 ES13907) to RAND in Santa Monica, California. For further information on L.A.FANS, go to lasurvey.rand.org. 1 1 Introduction Neighborhood racial and ethnic composition influences both Americans' evaluations of neighborhood quality and desirability (Farley et al. 1979, 1997; Clark 1992; Krysan et al. 2009) and their residential mobility decisions (South and Crowder 1998; Quillian 1999; Crowder and South 2008). In particular, non-Hispanic whites favor neighborhoods with fewer mi- nority residents, especially blacks, while non-Hispanic blacks tolerate neighborhoods with a broader range of racial compositions. Members of other racial and ethnic groups profess more tolerance of neighborhoods with greater racial and ethnic heterogeneity than whites do, although these preferences are also influenced by nativity (Charles 2006). These empir- ically observed, between group differences in neighborhood racial composition preferences are consistent with some degree of metropolitan level segregation (Bruch and Mare 2006; Schelling 1971). Research using survey-based vignettes to study neighborhood racial composition preferences often considers the racial composition of individuals' actual neighborhoods as influen- tial in their stated neighborhood preferences (Emerson et al. 2001; Charles 2000). However, the role of the racial composition of individuals' previous neighborhoods in real residential mobility decisions is rarely given this explicit treatment. Overlooking the effect of previous neighborhood experiences on subsequent neighborhood choices implies that individuals' residential histories have no bearing on their future neighborhood decisions. However, prior neighborhood contexts should provide substantial insight into prospective neighborhood choices. If individuals enter adulthood with fixed preferences for neighborhood racial composition and can obtain residence in the neighborhoods they prefer, then the racial composition of their previous neighborhoods should reflect their preferences and predict subsequent neighborhood choices. Alternately, race-based neighborhood preferences might change during adulthood, influenced by neighborhood experiences. Tolerance of racial or ethnic minorities may increase with greater inter-racial and inter-ethnic interaction (Allport 1954; Sigelman and Welch 1993; Wagner et al. 2006), or perceived competition between racial 2 or ethnic groups may exacerbate prejudices (Blumer 1958; Quillian 1995). This study uses data on residential mobility in Los Angeles, a multi-racial metropolis, to examine the degree to which individuals differ in their race-based neighborhood outcomes according to the composition of their most recent neighborhoods. To preview results, I find that, within racial groups, individuals' residential choices do differ according to their prior residential experiences. In particular, whites who originate in neighborhoods with larger proportions of blacks or Latinos appear to be less sensitive to the presence of these groups in their future neighborhoods. These results are consistent with either within-group, between-individual variation in fixed racial preferences or a process of learning predicted by inter-group contact theory. To reach these conclusions, this paper proceeds as follows: First I review theories of race-based preferences that predict an effect of past neighborhood racial composition on subsequent neighborhood outcomes. Second, I discuss the data and variables I use to investigate these theories. Third, I outline the methods, specifically conditional logistic regression, that I use to model patterns of neighborhood outcomes in the data. Fourth, I present results of my analyses. Finally, I conclude and briefly suggest new directions for research that explicitly examines how prior neighborhood experiences modify race-based residential preferences. 2 Racial Stereotypes and Race-Based Residential Preferences Individuals who negatively stereotype members of other racial and ethnic groups as unintel- ligent or welfare dependent, to take two examples, prefer neighborhoods with fewer members of these groups (Farley et al. 1994; Bobo and Zubrinski 1996; Charles 2006; Krysan et al. 2009). Individual-level stereotypes of racial and ethnic \others" may overlap with or engender stereotypes about the neighborhoods these groups occupy. For example, whites overestimate the criminal tendencies of young black males, and correspondingly, levels of crime in neighborhoods with larger portions of young black males, controlling for actual crime rates (Quillian and Pager 2001). Similarly, data from Chicago show that neighborhood racial composition affects perceptions of physical neighborhood disorder, as indicated 3 by graffiti and litter, above and beyond the systematic measures of disorder obtained by investigators (Sampson and Raudenbush 2004). Some neighborhood characteristics relevant to individuals' neighborhood choices may be more difficult for potential movers to observe directly. For these characteristics, individuals may use neighborhood racial composition to make inferences about the underlying characteristics of interest (Ellen 2000). For example, future neighborhood housing price trajectories are fundamentally unobservable. In this case, individuals may use racial composition to help infer price trajectories. Indeed, some whites take recent increases in a neighborhood's black population as a signal that housing prices will decline in the future, leading to choices to leave or avoid neighborhoods (Krysan 2002; Har- ris 1999). These inferences could be rooted in individuals' own prejudices (e.g., beliefs that blacks do not maintain their properties) or expectations concerning the prejudices of others (e.g., beliefs that others are prejudiced towards blacks and will avoid the neighborhood). The above suggests a key hypothesis, which has received substantial attention and sup- port in previous studies: individuals will avoid neighborhoods with larger proportions of negatively stereotyped racial and ethnic groups, as their presence induces perceptions of less desirable present and future neighborhood characteristics. This hypothesis is illustrated in part 1A of Figure 1. The hypothesis suggests that the probability that an individual will move into a neighborhood decreases as the representation of a negatively stereotyped out- group increases, all else being equal. In Los Angeles, to which the data employed in this study pertain, whites hold negative views of blacks and Latinos (Charles 2006, 2000; Bobo and Zubrinski 1996), and so will avoid neighborhoods with larger proportions of blacks and Latinos. Because blacks hold negative views of Latinos relative to whites and other blacks, I also expect blacks to avoid neighborhoods with large proportions of Latinos. Latinos, on the other hand, hold negative views of blacks relative to whites and other Latinos and should thus avoid neighborhoods with large proportions of blacks. More than influencing perceptions of racial and ethnic out-groups, stereotypes may also influence individuals' perceptions of their own groups, with some individuals buying into 4 negative stereotypes applied to them by others. For example, blacks in Los Angeles stereotype themselves more negatively than they do non-Hispanic whites and Asians (Bobo and Zubrinski 1996, p. 895). Thus I expect blacks, and possibly Latinos, to avoid neighborhoods

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